Widespread community forestry practices in Nepal's mid-hills catchments involve removal of forest products—including firewood, litter, fodder, and medicinal herbs—by the local communities. Uncertainty is growing about how sustainable the management of these catchments is and whether it can meet traditional needs and maintain ecosystem services, particularly water. As part of a broader study on the hydrological effects of community forestry practices, we measured selected soil properties, including saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks), bulk density (BD,) and soil organic carbon (SOC) across 4 depths (0–10, 10–20, 20–50 and 50–100 cm) in 3 types of community forest sites—broadleaf, pine-dominated, and mixed—in the Roshi Khola catchment of Kavre district. The same measurements were made at a minimally disturbed religious forest site in the catchment that had higher Ks values than the mixed and broadleaf sites, signifying a lower degree of forest use-related disturbance. Likewise, SOC values for the religious forest were significantly higher (P < 0.05) and BD values significantly lower than the pine-dominated and mixed forest sites, particularly at shallower depths (0–50 cm). Importantly, comparison of the median Ks values (16–98 mm h–1) with rainfall intensities measured at the catchment showed the less intensively used pine-dominated site to be conducive to vertical percolation with possible greater contributions to subsurface storage even during high-intensity rainfall events. These results highlight the critical role of forest use practices in landscape hydrology and have implications for the management of the forested catchments in the broader Himalayan region, particularly in relation to the negative local perceptions of the role of pine plantations on declining water resources.

中文翻译：

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尼泊尔中山森林集水区社区森林利用与水文效益之间的负权衡

尼泊尔中山集水区广泛的社区林业实践涉及当地社区清除森林产品——包括木柴、枯枝落叶、饲料和药草。关于这些流域的管理可持续性以及它是否能够满足传统需求并维持生态系统服务，特别是水的不确定性正在增加。作为对社区林业实践的水文影响的更广泛研究的一部分，我们测量了选定的土壤特性，包括 4 个深度（0-10， 10-20、20-50 和 50-100 厘米）在 Kavre 区 Roshi Khola 集水区的 3 种类型的社区林地——阔叶林、松林和混交林。在集水区中受干扰最小的宗教林地进行了相同的测量，其 Ks 值高于混交林地和阔叶林地，表明与森林利用相关的干扰程度较低。同样，宗教林的 SOC 值显着更高（P < 0.05），BD 值显着低于以松树为主的混交林地，尤其是在较浅的深度（0-50 厘米）。重要的是，将 Ks 中值 (16-98 mm h-1) 与在集水区测量的降雨强度进行比较表明，较少使用的以松树为主的场地有利于垂直渗透，即使在高降雨量期间也可能对地下储存做出更大贡献。强度降雨事件。